221 Words
by lemonn
Summary: Of inside and outside, of warm and cold, of hellos and goodbyes. 221 words and how they relate to Sherlock and John
1. 001-013

001: Captain

John bought Sherlock a pirate captain's outfit for his birthday - a joke. Sometimes Sherlock flops about in it in the flat alone - not a joke.

002: Servant

John always tips the waiters for both of them. Though he is furious when he steps outside to find Sherlock has not waited for him, never stops.

003: Inside

Sherlock hates the inside, whether its inside himself or inside his flat. The less things relate to him personally, the better. Outside, there's space to run away.

004: Outside

They have both always felt outside, different, but now their lives are full of inside jokes and inside glances.

005: Cold

Sherlock hates the cold ever since the front door of his house was slammed shut by his parents after his school report. On a winter's day.

006: Warm

A bath of a perfectly balanced temperature is John's necessary luxury; it is everything Afghanistan wasn't.

007: Book

When Sherlock mistreats a book, something inside John curls up. John loves books; Sherlock just needs them.

008: Drug

To ignore Sherlock's drug abuse would be immoral, to treat it would be against the doctor's code, to force him to get help from an outside source would impossible. John compromises by being there for Sherlock, quietly.

009: Dishes

Sherlock stops everything to watch John wash up, fascinated - he would throw the dishes into the wall. Or, if feeling polite, the bin. Or just not use plates. Or not eat.

010: Coat

Sherlock has been known to wash his coat in the sink. John doesn't point out the sink is for dishes, and the washing machine is right next to him. He just watches.

011: Cream

Sherlock notices that John suits cream clothes, drinks cream tea and has palms that turn cream in the cold.

012: Cane

John hangs his old cane next to Sherlock's skull; both are forgotten.

013: Cards

Snap! Sherlock tries to predict the next card whereas John relies on his physical speed. The game's a mess.

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**A/N: Thank you all for reading! 221 is not divisible by many things. Embarrassingly, I actually had to google 'what is 221 divisible by?'. Apparently a lot of people want to know the same thing. Anyway, 13 words per chapter in 17 chapter sounds good. Odd, Sherlockian numbers.**


	2. 014-026

014: Ability

What John finds easy, Sherlock finds hard. What Sherlock finds easy, John finds hard. That is, apart from staying still when the world never stops moving - they both find that hard.

015: Night

Sherlock knows how to hold John just right when he wakes up screaming, and not to speak.

016: Day

Sherlock doesn't tell that time through the amount of light. When there is a case, it's day. When there isn't, it's night. The sun has no relevance.

017: Alcohol

Sherlock avoids alcohol; it's the common man's drug. John happily consumes any they receive as a gift.

018: Birthday

Sherlock's and John's birthdays are treated very similarly: after avoiding it for too long, the other produces a carefully wrapped present.

019: Christmas

Sherlock hated Christmas's way of slowing down the world, until he met a man he was happy to watch for longer.

020: Belief

Sometimes John cannot believe that Sherlock considers his opinion.

021: Fact

Sherlock relies on his brain enough to not have to check facts. Apart from that John lives with him. That feels like it might slip away if Sherlock doesn't peek round the door to check when he feels too alone.

022: Goodbye

'Goodbye' was just another word for Sherlock, until John left for a month abroad.

023: Greetings

Sherlock never says greetings, apart from with his mother because her questions can never be delayed long enough.

024: Letters

When John rips open a hand-written letter, the sound of his childhood splatters in his mind and he smiles. When Sherlock opens a hand-written letter, he is only interested in the information on the page and not sadness over the increasing rarity of the experience. John is always a little disappointed by Sherlock's disregard for treasuring the past for the past's sake, reliving a memory for nostalgia rather than information and history being a list of facts.

025: Law

The law isn't a factor for Sherlock in any of his cases, apart from the minor inconvenience it causes when he solves crimes by committing crimes.

026: Music

When Sherlock's playing the violin in a darkened room, John spends his stands in the corner, feeling he's an intruder but unable to leave.


	3. 027-040

027: Dreams

Sherlock's lips are wide open. Kissable; the white of his teeth say 'please, delve in deeper. Please'. John fingers his dark hair, curled outwards at his neck. Sherlock's mouth reshuffles itself into a smile.

028: Complexity

John asks Sherlock why complexity excites him when it's logical, but not when it's emotional. Sherlock replies that he likes mazes - not hurricanes.

029:Cities

It's not that Sherlock just loves London, he loves it so much that he takes it for granted. Like a heart, or a lung.

030: Snow

Sherlock strode out the house like it was a normal day- until John threw snow at him; John had never seen Sherlock laugh so much.

031: Hands

How much longer Sherlock's fingers were than John's was confirmed when Sherlock put John's gloves on. After that, Sherlock stared at John's hands more. He measured them (the fingers, the widths, the lengths).

032: Green

John told Sherlock that since his army uniform, he didn't like the colour green. Sherlock took John on walks in the park, knowing John likes the outdoors and hoping John would remember the green of trees.

033: Church

When John returns from the Christmas service, he finds Sherlock by the white light by the window, hands trembling over his violin, mouth moving but forming no words, eyes closed. A Church of his own. John nods and quietly walks away.

034: Hours

Sherlock sits on the edge of John's bed and nudges him all night. When John asks what he's doing, Sherlock says he hasn't talked to him for 11 hours and it's been too long. It's only 4 hours later when Sherlock tells John that his mother's died.

035: Days

Some days Sherlock is unbearable, but its the evenings following those days that John finds him particularly beautiful.

036: Years

When they realise they've known each other for years, it feels like time doesn't exist.

037: Jokes

Sherlock considers researching 'yo mamma' jokes when he sees John laughing with his friends.

038: Woman

After Irene, John wonders if Sherlock would love him more if he was as fierce.

039: Family

Sherlock notices John's right eye, the closed fist that indicates he doesn't want to talk and drives them without comment to visit Harry in hospital.

040: Guilt

When John sees Sherlock jump, he forever feels guilty for his first thought: how could you do this to me?


	4. 041-054

041: Dancing

Various times, Sherlock has been asked to dance at parties by an oblivious girl. He always declines. John asks him once, as a joke, but when John leans into Sherlock's chest suddenly everything goes quiet.

042: Running

The first time Sherlock ran until his lungs hurt, stretching his physiology beyond comfort allowed, was when he heard John cry out in pain.

043: Fortnight

It is a fortnight before John and Lestrade let Sherlock know that 'chav' is not the new way to say 'ciao'.

044: Blind

Sherlock has an emergency back-up system if he loses his sight: his honed sense of smell, his animal-like hearing and John.

045: Musicals

Sherlock hates straight plays, but loves musicals. He can close the eyes and play the songs on his imaginary violin.

046: Drunk

The worst thing for Sherlock is that he cannot do his scarf up properly so John, giggling too, does it up for him.

047: Dare

Lestrade paid them twenty five pounds to dress up in each other's clothes; Sherlock couldn't even pull John's jumped over his head; John looked lost in Sherlock's scarf.

048: Truth

John is the only experiment Sherlock is happy to never understand, Sherlock explains. That he accepts he will never understand. For the result is unexpected and far too ground-breaking to do so: he just likes being with John Watson.

049: Silent

Sherlock's silence is the loudest John has ever known.

050: Scar

We all have scars, but the stories of Sherlock's and John's could fill novels (have done).

051: Taste

On the rare event Sherlock makes tea, he sips each mug first - and gives John the one with the better taste.

052: Nightmares

Sherlock plays the violin particularly loudly when John has nightmares. John shouts angrily, but at least wakes up.

053: Test

Sherlock often eats dinner with his knife and fork the wrong way round or smudges different substances on his cuffs or sprinkles odd powders on his hair. John always notices. He always passes the tests.

054: Trick

John once nestled Sherlock's mobile in the folds of his scarf at the back of his neck. When it rung, Sherlock kept spinning around. It was like watching a dog chase it's own tail.

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**Thank you for your reviews etc. So much. All ideas have really helped - and any further suggestions/prompts are appreciated (needed).**

**For a creative and, er, slightly insensitive definition of chav for all you non-UKers, please look at Urban Dictionary:**


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